Toolbox

Chris Anderson is the Curator of TED. His article in the Harvard Business Review outlining tips on how to give a killer presentation is outstanding and definitely worth the read. He also includes video of some incredibly compelling TED Talks.

Ninety percent of people struggle to find one single reason that they ‘love’ presenting, but when it comes to ‘hate’ and ‘fear’ they tend to have lots to say!

I hear things like, “I hate presenting because I always forget what I am supposed to say.” Or “I fear presenting because I will look unprepared in front of the audience.”

Most of the reasons people ‘hate’ and ‘fear’ presenting comes down to one simple, time-consuming, unavoidable truth… Not enough time was put into rehearsing.

You might assume that a particular speaker is naturally gifted, confident, and polished on stage. What you don’t see is that it took them hours and hours of practice to get there.

No one, and I mean no one, is born a great presenter!

One of the speakers that Chris Anderson refers to in his article is Dr. Jill Bolte-Taylor. She has one of the most popular TED talks of all time! Apparently, she rehearsed 200 times before she delivered it in front of a TED audience. Dr. Jill’s presentation seemed natural, authentic, animated, and conversational. Many people don’t realize that it takes practice to sound conversational.

“But…” say my guests, “we don’t have time to rehearse!”

Of course you don’t if you are slapping it together the night before! Every great presentation requires a timeline that should include at least three days for rehearsal.

The rehearsal should be in front of your colleagues, but in absence of that opportunity, feel free to rehearse in front of your cat, dog, goldfish or car radio driving to and from work.

The most important thing is to rehearse, rehearse and rehearse some more!

Your personal brand should mean just as much to you as Apple meant to Steve Jobs. And if Jobs was scrupulous about every aspect of his presentations, shouldn’t you be?

Presentation skills workshops

Do you need help refining your inner storyteller? Reach out to the Barefoot Brainstorming team today.

When I was young, I was lucky enough to travel with my family for vacations.

My mother loved the concept of the Duty Free store … and was a loyal customer!!

She loved to try new perfumes … particularly if they were on sale!

As we headed for dinner on the first night of our vacation, she would always wear the new perfume.

Too many years later … I have been in elevators remarking ‘OMG that smell??!!’ when someone enters the elevator wearing that perfume. I close my eyes and I am instantly transported to the first night of the family vacation … I can see the hotel and the dining room… I can tell you what I was wearing … I can even tell you what I had for dinner.

When you first smell a new scent, you link it to an event, a person, a thing or even a moment.

Because we encounter most new odors in our youth, smells often call up childhood memories.

Olfactory thought centres play a huge role in brainstorming … either consciously or unconsciously!

All of the creative exercises I use are rooted in play and are designed to transport guests to their unencumbered childhood state where new ideas are easy and plentiful. There is nothing more fun and evocative to the nose than Play-Doh, crayons, glue sticks and Mr. Sketch Markers.

It is truly incredible to experience a room full of adults opening canisters of new Play-Doh and remarking ‘OMG … that smell??!!’ … before jumping into the most creative ideas!

Some fast facts about creative thinking and the brain !

1) The brain doesn’t like trying unknown things. Using highly visual, tactile, and auditory methods makes things more brain friendly because it creates emotional responses within an experiential framework. This process allows the brain to discover new information and then store this information into long-term memory.

2) When you build tactile, visible things, they can be shared with teammates. This allows all participants to engage, explore, and build on each other’s ideas.

3) When problem solving, the brain stores information in the frontal cortex, which cannot effectively store more than seven things at once. Do you remember the scene in ‘Through the Looking Glass’when the White Queen tells Alice “sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast?”

That’s pretty cool, White Queen,but you’re clearly relying on your frontal cortex or your impossible thing count would be way higher. If you want to make that number skyrocket … build stuff !

4) Build things. Objects we build with our hands hold large amounts of information. This frees up the working memory for idea generation and innovative thinking.

6) While problem solving, people quickly converge or filter too soon. As soon as an idea is put on the table, someone plays devil’s advocate and throws out the baby with the bathwater. BigStorming® allows for both processes—convergent and divergent thinking— to be applied appropriately.

The other day, I saw one of those bite-sized polls in the paper conducted by Compas Research about where or when CEOs got their best ideas. According to the results, 9% responded “When they were asleep”, 10% said “While exercising”, 11% said “While showering”, and 24% said “During their commute”. The winner? A less than overwhelming 26% of CEOs said they get their best ideas from “Brainstorming.”

As a professional brainstormer, I’m sure you can understand my breathless ambivalence. My craft managed to whip sleeping by 17% !!

After looking at the numbers again, I was re-amazed that 26% of CEOs said that they actually took part in brainstorming at all. If I had to, I’d have guessed it at 10%. And then it hit me like a plate of undercooked chicken that what these CEOs may have described as brainstorming was really just a meeting with the same usual suspects, in the same usual location, only with a different word at the top of the agenda.

If Brainstorming Isn’t A Priority, It Won’t Work

Like the quality of a roofing job or an aircraft overhaul, there are good brainstorming sessions and there are bad ones. And for the financial health of many organizations, the consequences of a bad or ineffective brainstorming session can be just as dire as a leaky roof or collapsed landing gear. Why? Because it’s an opportunity lost to come up with a big idea. Because it’s a default vote for the crushing inertia of the status quo when forward movement is a crucial imperative.

Many of us have endured bad brainstorming sessions – where the most frequent insight is “That would never work” and the end result is “Keep doing what we’re doing only do it better, faster or re-package it in a different colour”.

That’s probably how we ended up with purple ketchup. For other companies, the results aren’t as amusing – like Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Not this quarter, and maybe not this year, but someday… New ideas are like oxygen for the corporate brain. They energize. They stimulate. They nourish. A company is like the human body – if you only breathe the air you just exhaled, you’ll perish.

Where Can Brainstorming Go Wrong?

These three conditions absolutely guarantee brainstorming failure.

1. If the CEO and entire senior team don’t attend
2. If the session isn’t positioned as a must-attend event for everyone
3. If team members from all levels within the organization aren’t invited

With a magnifying glass continually focused on next quarter results and corporate governance, it’s easy to see why CEOs keep brainstorming at the bottom of their To-Do lists or don’t include it at all – until there’s a problem.

The reality is that brainstorming and idea generation should be seen as cornerstones of corporate stewardship because the brand – any brand – requires constant scrutiny and refreshment. Brainstorming is a formalized opportunity for everyone to show off their insights, creativity, business smarts and commitment to corporate success.

Brainstorming lets the team look around at a bigger world of ideas and possibilities. It encourages new perspectives and it drives risk management right into the mainstream consciousness of the organization. After all, when you have your nose down to the grindstone all the time, there’s a good chance you won’t see the piano falling from the sky.

Ignore The Future And It Will Become An Emergency

Besides stimulating the higher brain functions and imagination of organizations, CEOs can use brainstorming to identify surprising stars. Some of the most dazzling and original ideas I’ve encountered in sessions have come from the shipping department, inside sales and accounting. It may be that a brainstorming session was the first time these people had ever been encouraged or allowed to think out loud.

My sessions have also generated some insights about consumers, customers and the true state of the marketplace that raised some previously unaware eyebrows. A brainstorm is one of the few times a CEO gets to overhear what really happens on the front lines of the business.

For an enlightened and progressive CEO, by all means keep a notepad by your bed, a grease pencil for the shower and a recording device in the car. And while you’re at it, encourage everyone in your company to do the same. Then get together to capture and refine the raw materials for your next strategic business plan.